


Home for the Holidays

by Sholio



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Christmas, Fluff, Future Fic, Holidays, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-19
Updated: 2017-12-19
Packaged: 2019-02-16 14:11:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13055604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sholio/pseuds/Sholio
Summary: When a blizzard prevents the three from going home for Christmas, they have to make their own Christmas in their new apartment, terrible tree and nonfunctional oven and everything.





	Home for the Holidays

**Author's Note:**

  * For [crazykookie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/crazykookie/gifts).



".... really coming down out there, folks! Looks like we're getting a white Christmas for sure."

"That's right, Mary, but my advice to you folks traveling for the holidays is: don't. That's the word from Gary with the greater Indianapolis road report --"

"Could one of you turn that down, please?" Jonathan complained over his shoulder. "What was that, Mom?"

"I said I'd rather have you spend Christmas in the city than slide off the road trying to get back to Hawkins," his mother said, her voice tinny in his ear. In the background, the blare of the TV news faded to a murmur. "Please, honey, promise me you aren't going to try. Promise?"

"Come on, Mom, you know they exaggerate on TV --"

"Honey. No. You forget I have an inside source for this sort of thing, right?" He could just picture her winking and tapping her forehead in what she probably thought was a conspiratorial sort of look; he could _hear_ it. She was such a mom sometimes. "The police department has been handling stranded motorist calls all day, and it's just getting worse out there. _Please,_ Jonathan."

"But I have the presents for you and Will here, Mom --"

"And you can give them to us just as well on New Year's," his mother said firmly. "Just promise me, honey, or I'll spend the entire day imagining you dead in a ditch --"

"I promise, Mom," he sighed, defeated.

"Oh, sweetie. We can talk on Christmas, and I'll turn up _A Christmas Carol_ on TV so you can hear it, okay? I'm going to put your brother on now. He's been clamoring to talk to you."

Jonathan had to smile to himself; the background of the call was completely silent, and Will "clamoring" for anything was a difficult thing to imagine. "Yeah, go ahead. Love you, Mom."

He extricated himself from the phone conversation eventually (his mother had to talk to him again with further admonishments not to drive down and instructions for cooking a Christmas dinner without setting the oven on fire; Jonathan didn't have the heart to tell her that they didn't even have an oven that worked) and hung up the phone to look over at Steve, flopped on the couch in front of the mostly-silent TV. Nancy's typewriter keys still clattered cheerfully from the office they'd made out of the second bedroom of the little two-bedroom apartment; it might be Christmas break at the university, but she was still writing something.

"I'm going to have company in my misery, right?" Jonathan said. "You and Nance aren't planning to drive down to Hawkins, right?"

"Are you kidding?" Steve gestured lazily at the TV, where a miserable-looking reporter was hunched in a coat, with snow blowing across him sideways, in front of an emergency vehicle flipped over on its roof. "I'm not _crazy."_

"Great." Jonathan looked around the apartment, with its cigarette-burned carpet, dingy walls, and the lamp that had a tendency to flicker (and still made him jump every time it did). "I guess this is home sweet home for the holidays."

 

*

 

They'd been living together since late August, when Nancy and Jonathan came back for their second year at UINDY. Steve would've been a junior if he hadn't dropped out near the end of his freshman year and gone to work for his dad. But when Nancy and Jonathan came back to Hawkins for the summer at the end of _their_ freshman year, after the first few crazy days of parking down by the lake and Steve climbing through Jonathan's bedroom window and all of them just _being together_ , they got to talking about next year. Nancy had a full-ride scholarship; Jonathan was getting by on working and need-based scholarships, going to an in-state university to save money (and Nancy had taken the full ride, when scholarships plus her parents could have bought her an education almost anywhere in the country). So if Steve got a job in Indianapolis, they could afford a place together. Nancy and Jonathan could move off campus, Steve could move out of his parents' house, and they wouldn't have to sneak around anymore.

So they did.

It was two bedrooms on the third floor of a cinderblock building near the railroad tracks. It'd been too hot when they'd move in -- the rattling window-mounted air conditioner doing little more than moving the air around and dribbling all over the afghan Nancy's grandma gave her -- and now, in late December, it was freezing. Half the washers and dryers in the laundry room didn't work, and the "private courtyard" for the apartment complex, promised in the ad, had turned out to be a concrete space about eight feet square, carpeted in dogshit. 

But it was _theirs._

The apartment was furnished, at least, so they'd put two beds together in one bedroom, filling the entire room with no extra space to do anything else except crawl through the door onto the mega-bed, piled high with blankets and pillows. The other room was a sort of study/workspace. One end had Nancy's typewriter, surrounded with bookshelves, a set they'd bought dinged up at a garage sale and some extra ones made from concrete blocks and boards. The other end was curtained off for Jonathan's home darkroom. Nancy and Jonathan had repeatedly offered to make space in the "office" for Steve, but he insisted that he didn't really have any hobbies that took up space, not like Nancy's journalism or Jonathan's photography.

So this was home. Home was Steve watching sports in the living room, sprawled on the old couch that came with the place (which Nancy had covered with a flowered sheet, to cover up the stains and the fact that it smelled a little bit like dog). Home was the busy clicking of Nancy's typewriter keys at all hours of the day and night. Home was Jonathan sitting by the couch, sorting through photos still damp from the darkroom while Steve's fingers ran through Jonathan's hair and the meaningless babble of a sports announcer played on the TV. Home was falling asleep together, all of them touching, stretched across the seam between the two mattresses; home was waking up when Nancy and Steve got up (Nancy to go to her morning class, Steve for work) while Jonathan lounged in bed an extra hour or two -- no classes 'til noon this semester -- and then got up in the silent apartment to find they'd always made sure to leave coffee for him.

Yeah. This was home.

Home was, however, lacking in any sort of Christmas decorations. Jonathan didn't really care, but Nancy looked a little sad about it and that was it, Steve was sweeping the snow off his car and they were off to find a tree ... on Christmas Eve, in a blizzard.

They made it as far as a local chain grocery store that had two trees remaining: a miserable-looking, frozen stick with a few scrawny branches in the natural-tree section outside, and a boxed aluminum tree with a faintly pink cast.

Nancy voted "aluminum", Steve voted "real tree", and Jonathan was pressed into service as a tie-breaker. He pointed to the real tree because he kind of felt sorry for it. Anyway, they'd only have to put up with it for one Christmas since it'd be dead afterwards. He could see getting stuck with the pink tree for the next ten years.

Between the holiday and the blizzard, the store was thoroughly picked over. It had nothing even remotely like a turkey or goose left, but Steve pounced on a package of prime rib teetering on the edge of its expiration date. No premade pies remained, but baking a pie couldn't be _that_ hard, right? They got flour, sugar, the last can of pumpkin pie filling on the shelf, a tub of margarine, and a bag of frozen vegetables because Nancy pointed out they should be able to tell their parents they ate at least _one_ healthy thing. Steve chucked a box of candy canes into the basket too.

They were halfway home when Jonathan punched the back of Steve's seat (he'd lost rock-paper-scissors with Nancy for shotgun, so he was crammed in with the tree). "We didn't buy decorations."

"Thought you weren't interested in Christmas," Steve shot back as he carefully navigated in the ruts left by the vehicle in front of them through the unplowed street.

"It's not worth going back for," Nancy said, ever practical. "They're probably almost out of decorations too. We can find something around the house."

 

*

 

Steve spent half the evening on the phone to Nancy's mom, burning through an entire long-distance calling card while Karen walked him through the process of making a pie crust.

"Are you sure you can't put Nancy on the phone, dear?" Karen asked as Steve stared at what was rapidly turning into paste under his efforts. It'd been _so_ dry, a little more water shouldn't have hurt, right?

"She's busy," Steve said quickly, because Nancy was the worst cook in the household by far. He probably should've let Jonathan do this, but Jonathan and Nancy were both lying on the living room floor with a bunch of Jonathan's photos, Nancy's typewriter paper, glue and scissors, attempting to make decorations for the tree which was currently propped up in a coffee can (since a tree stand was something else they'd forgot to buy). Steve was 100% sure he'd be hopeless at anything artistic, so pie crusts it was.

"Well, it's very brave of you to try," Karen said. "Pie crusts are very difficult and I'm sure you're doing quite well. All right, now you'll need your rolling pin."

"Rolling pin," Steve said blankly, looking at their small collection of cooking supplies on the counter. "Oops?"

"Don't panic. You can use something else. Do you have a water glass or a jar?"

In the background of the phone, he could hear Christmas music, the cheerful chatter of little Holly (not really so little anymore), and some yelling that was definitely Mike and his friends. Steve felt a little tug in his chest. He missed those stupid kids like hell sometimes.

"Mom!" Mike yelled tinnily in the background.

"Just a minute, sweetheart, I'm on the phone to Steve! Did you preheat the oven?"

Rats. He'd forgotten about that. "Uh ... the oven doesn't exactly ... work."

There was a brief silence on the other end of the line. "You're going to have to cook this pie, Steve," Karen said, a trace of impatience creeping into her voice. There was some clinking; she was working on her own holiday baking while she talked to him, cord stretched from the kitchen phone just as his was stretched across the apartment's small living room.

"Well, I know _that._ Can't we cook it on top of the stove or something?"

"Mrs. Wheeler, did you say you're talking to Steve?" someone else yelled in the background, and Steve caught himself grinning. "Can I talk to him, Mrs. Wheeler?"

"Of course you can, Dustin. Steve, I'm going to see if I can think of any ideas for your oven problem, okay? What's wrong with it? Ted might know how to fix it."

Yeah, _that_ was likely. "I don't know. It just doesn't work. We've been storing canned stuff in there." Steve got down on his knees in front of the oven, adjusting the phone against his shoulder with a floury hand.

Karen gave a tiny sigh, and then Dustin was yelling in his ear, "Merry Christmas, Steve!"

"God!" He dropped the phone and caught it. "Try a little louder next time, jerk. I'm only deaf in one ear so far."

"Is it snowing up there? It's snowing like hell --"

In the background: "Dustin!"

"-- like heck down here. Me and Lucas made a whole pack of snow ... dogs in his front yard. Then Lucas's little sister started kicking off their heads and Lucas pushed her headfirst into a snowbank."

Steve laughed. "We'll have to invite her along next time we go monster hunting."

" _Dude._ Are you shi -- are you serious? Have you _met_ Erica?"

"I have," Steve said, stretching to feel behind the stove. Ugh, it was all greasy back here. This was probably where the ants were coming from that they kept having to set out traps for. "If it's Erica versus Demogorgon, I'm putting my money on Erica. So have you shaken your presents yet?"

"Of course, c'mon. Mom got me a _huge_ box. I think it's a telescope. What'd you get me?"

"No hints. I'll have to bring it down whenever the snow stops, so it'll be more of a New Year's present at that point -- _Mother fuck!"_

It was an all-over jolt, like getting kicked. Steve blinked; somehow he was flat on his back, the phone was gone, and his whole body tingled in a weird way.

Two voices yelled "Steve!" and then Nancy and Jonathan's worried faces came into view. There was also a tinny babble of something that sounded like a voice on TV but was, he realized as his brain slowly came back online, probably Dustin having a heart attack on the other end of the phone.

"Don't touch the stove," Steve said as Nancy and Jonathan propped him up, one on each side. "I think it ... what's that humming sound?" Something better not be about to explode.

"I think the oven's on," Jonathan said after a flabbergasted glance at it.

"Oh God," Nancy gasped, dropping Steve (on Jonathan, mostly). "All the canned stuff is in there!"

While Nancy hastily pulled cans out of the oven, Steve, still propped on Jonathan, reached for the phone, where he was treated to a babble of at least two or three panicked fifteen-year-olds. "Guys," he said when he managed to get a word in. "Calm down."

"What? What? Was it a Demogorgon? What?"

"No, I electrocuted myself on the stove. Don't talk about Demogorgons in front of Mrs. Wheeler, man."

"It's just a D&D thing!" he heard Mike say quickly and loudly in the background.

"Could one of you dorks tell Mrs. Wheeler the oven's working again and ask her what temperature you cook a pie at?"

By the time this information had been relayed back and forth, Steve was starting to feel a little less shaky and weird. He let Dustin pass the phone over to Mike, who wanted to say Merry Christmas to Nancy (or rather, was being forced by his mother to say Merry Christmas to Nancy) and then went back to flopping pathetically on Jonathan, who was sitting on the floor in the kitchen with his legs spread out and Steve between them.

"You okay?" Jonathan asked, pressing a kiss against his neck.

"Fine. Just stupid." Steve twisted his head to the side and squinted at the oven. He could see the glowing coils from here. It appeared to be heating up nicely. "So, uh, I fixed the stove."

Jonathan's soft laugh shook his body. "And we've got a decorated Christmas tree. Once you get the pie in the oven, come and see."

"Steve," Nancy said, coming back over after hanging up the phone, "what is this mess on the countertop?"

"It's a pie crust," Steve said, squinting up at her and feeling a trifle defensive.

"No, it's not."

Jonathan gave Steve another quick kiss on the neck and a little push. "I know how to make a pie crust. Why don't you go help Nancy decorate the tree and I'll finish this."

Steve peeled himself off the floor and went to see what they'd done to the tree.

It was definitely no Harrington family Christmas tree, beautifully coordinated in silver and gold. But they'd made some paper chains -- Steve remembered doing that in elementary school, though with construction paper instead of white typing bond -- and they'd cut up some of Jonathan's color photos to make little stars and other shapes, cut from the blue of the sky, the sharp green of grass, the vivid purple of a field of roadside flowers. Nancy and Jonathan had also hung the entire box of candy canes on the tree, which reminded Steve sharply of Christmas at the Byers house -- it was something Jonathan's family always did (candy canes on the tree, for kids to lift off and nibble as they walked past), not something his or Nancy's family had ever done.

Merged traditions for a shared household.

But the tree was still missing anything sparkly. Tinsel, that kind of thing. They didn't have anything like ... hmmm ...

"Ooh," Steve said, "idea." He went to the kitchen and nudged his way past Jonathan -- who now had a smudge of flour on one cheek and was rolling out a pie crust that actually looked like a pie crust -- to fish a handful of soda and beer cans out of the trash. Some work with scissors and a pocket knife, and soon Nancy got the idea and helped him bend pieces of shiny metal into different shapes, folding them to display the shiny inside. They added a little flash and sparkle to the sparse branches. Cut into strips, they even kinda looked like tinsel.

And if you flipped them around, the other side was bright and colorful ...

 

*

 

Another thing they'd forgotten was a pie pan, but by now Jonathan was in full-fledged "making do" mode, and he pressed the pie crust into their one bread pan (given to them by Nancy's mother, as were most of the kitchen implements they owned). A square pie ought to taste the same as an ordinary pie. He put it into the miraculously-working oven to prebake and wandered into the living room to see what was making Steve and Nancy giggle.

"What are you two doing to the --" He stopped as Steve finished meticulously cutting out a Pepsi logo and placed it with care on a branch of the tree, just above a Coca-Cola logo and not too far away from Budweiser.

Jonathan opened his mouth and closed it. Nancy was quietly choking.

"You've _commercialized our tree,"_ Jonathan managed to say at last, in disbelief.

Steve grinned up at him unrepentantly. "It's sponsored by Pepsi."

Nancy squeaked out, "Oh Jonathan, your face!" and then collapsed on the floor.

The "corporate sponsors" were duly turned into confetti, the tin-can tinsel allowed to remain. Jonathan went to retrieve the pie crust from the oven and fill it.

"Oven still working?" Steve asked from the living room, where he was now idly channel-surfing on the TV while Nancy added a few last touches to the tree, including a couple of her earrings for added sparkle.

"So far."

"Don't turn it off."

"We can't leave it on all the time," Jonathan said.

"Yeah, but we don't know if it'll start up again."

"Fair enough," Jonathan muttered, sliding the pie onto a rack.

He came back into the living room to find Nancy and Jonathan huddled up under her grandma's afghan, having found a Christmas special on TV. They pulled back the edge of the afghan to make room for him, and they all wriggled around until they managed to get into a comfortable, afghan-wrapped heap.

On the TV, colorful animated characters were singing about Christmas. 

"Awww," Nancy said wistfully, "we should've bought eggnog."

"We could make it," Steve suggested. "What's in it?"

"Eggs," Jonathan said. He hesitated. "And ... nog?"

"I guess that's a no, then."

"Maybe we should buy a cookbook," Jonathan suggested. "Now that we have an oven so we can actually cook stuff." 

"Thanks to my noble sacrifice," Steve pointed out.

Nancy giggled. "Poor baby." Happily squished between Jonathan and the arm of the couch, she reached over Jonathan to run her fingers through Steve's hair. "How _are_ you feeling?"

"Fine. Still a little tingly, but it's going away." Steve nudged Jonathan. "How 'bout you?"

"Me, why me? I didn't electrocute myself."

"No, but I know how close you are with your family." Steve's voice had a trace of something ... not envy, exactly. Just wistfulness, maybe. "It's not really the same, here. Are you okay?"

Jonathan leaned back against Nancy, and glanced over at their tree, glittering with handmade decorations. The apartment was starting to fill with the smell of baking pumpkin pie.

"No, it's not the same," he said, and under the afghan, he found one of each of their hands and twined his fingers with theirs. "And I'll be happy to see them when we do. But this just as good."

He really was home for Christmas.


End file.
